Tell folks what the book Inspiration Porn is about in a minute or less.

Ooh, okay.

Um, Inspiration Porn takes a term used for disabled people that is very infantilizing and feels like a microaggression, and it's my way of kind of reclaiming that slur, because the reality is, is that I have built a life for myself that 15-year-old me would've been gooped, gagged, if that kind of language existed back in 2002.

Um, and so it's me kind of reflecting back on the life I have built for myself and how I actually accomplished it.

Um, it's not self-helpy and it's not treat-ly.

Um, I would say it's pretty no-nonsense, but it's kind of my way of taking this feeling of being deemed as inspiring for just, like, walking outside and buying Red Vines, and actually making it something that I can reclaim and make my own.

[laughs]

Um, so, you know, it, but, like, so they kind of ran the gamut, you know what I mean? And I, I remember, like, I would write fake interviews with celebrities that sometimes people thought were real.

Terms apply.

Anything to be different at all.

In fact, Provincetown had always been a very loaded place for me because I'd always been kind of invisible.

Like, you know, sex everywhere.

It's like water, water everywhere, not a drop to drink.

And so, yeah, going there in 2018 after Special came out, I truly did not even think for one second, oh, people might know who I am there.

And when we were taking the ferry from Boston to Provincetown, it became pretty immediately apparent that it was going to be different that year.

a

Uh, Ryan, Sabrina E. wants to know one part of the Summer House reunion that completely shocked you.

I, I truly think, I mean, this is, like, not revolutionary, but just, like, I would say Amanda, 'cause I had a lot of empathy for her at first, and I didn't wanna go down that parasocial scandal route, route that we took where we, like, ate Raquel alive, or Rachel, sorry.

Yeah.

And there was a lack of feeling, and I honestly felt like not only did she not feel remorse, but I felt like she felt strong contempt for Sierra, and actually just, like, and resented her, which I thought was really interesting I don't know.

But so I would say her behavior freaked me out the most.

Were you part of that decision-making

process? Well, no, I mean, Stephen Dunn was the creator and showrunner.

And so that was his idea.

And obviously it took me a second to come around to it because it's such a gun violence is such a stain on America.

And I think people are really, really uncomfortable with it being reflected back at them.

Like, I just don't think we want to deal with it or acknowledge it in kind of meaningful way.

And I had this sort of visceral reaction of like, that's going to be very intense and that might turn people off.

Exactly.

It's not.

But it's interesting 'cause like I actually have a lot of empathy for Amanda and Kyle, and watching them this season for them both.

The dynamic of Amanda and Kyle is fascinating, which is that Kyle, because he is a straight male who doesn't know how to communicate and his first stop is always rage, always destroys himself.

Even though I think when he talks about, you know, the problems in our relationship have to do with intimacy, connection, communication are very real.

Meanwhile, I think Amanda takes some weird kind of solace in being in this horrible groundhog day with her husband.

I think that there's comfort in her feeling victimized by her husband and not feeling compelled to change anything, to stay frozen because I think she's too scared to do anything.

Yeah.

I always have when it comes to my work.

Hold for applause.

Uh, yeah, exactly.

So brave.

Uh, and, and we were, we were shooting in Austin, Texas, and my co-star Poonam was hungover, and she was flying home to do some guest spot on some n- NBC sitcom and then flying back to do the show, and she was hungover as fuck, and she goes, "Ugh, well, thank God I'm in first class." And I go, "You're in first class?" And I real- [laughs] she goes, "You're not?" [laughs]

Mm-hmm.

And sometimes you need to take a break from Dax, you know what I mean? So I'm listening to it, and this is literally, like, what it is.

It's like, "Oh my God, I fucking love you." And then the celebrity's like, "Are you kidding me? I feel, like, so safe right now.

Like, like, literally, like, we're family." Like, I literally was like, "Okay, like, I'm with you.

... to see.

Oh, thank you.

I'm glad you liked it.

I mean, you know, sex has always been kind of weirdly my muse, and I think it's shifted.

Whereas, like, when I did Special, you know, I was with my boyfriend, who I'm still with now, but I, my, I still was very sexually inexperienced outside that relationship.

You know, we didn't open things up until I was shooting Queer as Folk.

And the way that people had sex, the way people moved through the world in a sexual way, when I would hear people's stories about them fucking, when I would read Butt magazine and hear the, like read those stories, it all felt so, like, sci-fi to me.

Jesus fucking Christ, why haven't we written a pilot together is what I wanna know."